A major drive of the  AIADMK government in Tamil Nadu (pop.72 million) to ensure admissions under s.12 (1) (c) of the Right of Children to Free & Compulsory Education (RTE) Act, 2009 (which mandates reservation of 25 percent capacity in private, unaided non-minority primary schools for children from socio-economically disadvantaged households in their neighbourhood) in the state’s 20,822 private nursery/primary, matriculation and government-aided schools, has resulted in a surge of applications for the academic year 2018-19. This year, over 128,000 children from economically weaker households (annual incomes of less than Rs.2 lakh) and disadvantaged groups (SC/ST/BC/MBC) have applied for admission under s.12 (1) (c) into private schools cf. 119,000 children admitted in 2017-18.

However, monitors of public education are less than jubilant about the increase in the number of s.12 (1) (c) applications because they entertain grave doubts whether child applicants for RTE quota seats are actually from the poor and economically backward classes. 

Production of fake income certificates and documents to avail free-of-charge high-quality education in private schools has become a cottage industry. Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and OBCs (other backward castes) constitute 85 percent of Tamil Nadu’s population. Since there’s a direct correlation between caste and poverty, and there’s high illiteracy among backward castes/classes, the state government’s RTE Rules permit SC, ST and OBC parents to submit caste rather than income proof documents for admission of their children under s.12 (1) (c). This provision has provided an opportunity for the “creamy layer” within these caste groups, whose children are ineligible for quota admission because they aren’t ‘poor’ or from the ‘economically weaker sections’, to corner s.12 (1) (c) seats in top-ranked private schools. 

But even as s.12 (1) (c) is being blatantly misused — and is welcomed as yet another incomes-yielding opportunity for the state’s notoriously corrupt bureaucracy — private school managements, which had challenged the constitutional validity of this provision of the RTE Act (Assn. of Unaided Schools of Rajasthan vs Union of India, 2012) in the Supreme Court and failed, are indifferent. They are more concerned about state governments’ failure to reimburse the modest compensation they are entitled to for admitting children under s.12 (1) (c). Under s.12 (2), the state government is obliged to pay private schools the average per-child expense it incurs in its (government) schools.

“First, we are forced to replace 25 percent of our fees-paying students in class I and provide them free-of-charge education until class VIII, which is a huge revenue loss for us. And even the partial compensation payable to us for RTE admissions made last year, hasn’t been paid as yet. To make matters worse, our tuition fees are capped by the state-appointed fees fixation committee. We are being squeezed from all sides,” says V. Jayendran, correspondent of the Jayendra Swamigal Silver Jubilee School in Tirunelveli and president of the Tirunelveli Matriculation Higher Secondary Schools Association.

Yet, the root cause of the annual scramble of the poor and not-so-poor for admission into private schools is that successive state governments have done precious little to improve and upgrade the quality of education dispensed in Tamil Nadu’s 34,180 government primary schools. Since the RTE Act became law in 2010, 320,000 students have enrolled in private matriculation and budget schools. This has drained hundreds of government schools of students and forced the AIADMK government’s decision last month to amalgamate 810 schools with enrolment of less than 10 students with the nearest government school. Peculiarly, these mergers have provoked strident opposition from several teachers’ unions in the state for denying young children the right to elementary education within a one-kilometre radius. Plans are afoot for an indefinite protest hunger strike.

With the government’s focus having shifted from raising teaching-learning standards and contemporisation of government schools to s.12 (1) ( c) admissions and clamping ceilings on private school tuition fees, private schools, which aspire to provide world-class education by investing in infrastructure, qualified teachers and technology, have been hard hit. The danger confronting K-12 education in Tamil Nadu is that with academic standards in government schools showing no signs of improving and private schools in a tailspin, the state’s reputation for excellent K-12 education is set to suffer severe damage. 

Hemalatha Raghupathi (Chennai)